


Forget-Me-Not Blue, I Love You Two

by Anonymous



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Amnesia, Multi, Romance, Tattoos, Troped Madness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:01:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29875344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Echo gets it.They think she feels this way just because she keeps forgetting about how they got to Skyring and that they're trying to leave the planet in a few years time. They think it's all because she forgets that Bellamy even exists.But she loves Hope and Gabriel. She really, truly loves them both.And memory loss or not, she's going to prove it to them.
Relationships: Echo/Gabriel Santiago | Xavier, Echo/Hope Diyoza, Echo/Hope Diyoza/Gabriel Santiago | Xavier, Hope Diyoza/Gabriel Santiago | Xavier
Comments: 5
Kudos: 6
Collections: TROPED: Madness 2.0





	Forget-Me-Not Blue, I Love You Two

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Qualifying Round of [Troped Madness](https://troped-fanfic-challenge.tumblr.com/):
> 
>  **Character** : Echo kom Azgeda  
>  **Theme** : Romance  
>  **Trope #1** : Amnesia AU  
>  **Trope #2** : Tattoos
> 
> VERY excited for Troped Madness this year! Definitely tried something different with this one.. please suspend any medical disbelief about my use of the amnesia trope, lol. It is in no way an accurate depiction of amnesia.

Echo finds the small blue flowers a little ways out from the cabin.

They’re a soft blue, small little clumps of them gathered around the base of one of the tall trees she’s found are native on Skyring. She’s been on the planet for— a while —and she immediately thinks of Hope.

Hope loves the Herc-a-lees roses, and Echo’s sure Hope will love these flowers as a new addition to the roses they keep in a jar in the cabin. She picks them carefully, making sure to keep all of the blue petals intact, and warmth bubbles in her stomach as she imagines the smile that will be on Hope’s face when Echo hands her the flowers, trying not to be too obvious about her feelings while still getting the point across.

And with that thought in mind, she carefully places the blue flowers in the basket her and Gabriel use to gather the fruits and vegetables from their garden, and makes her way back to the cabin with an extra skip in her step. 

She knows Hope and Gabriel are home as soon as she passes through the rickety gate and can hear their boisterous voices and laughs echoing through the open windows. The sound brings a soft smile to her face at the comforting sounds.

They welcome her back as soon as she opens the door, Hope already talking a mile a minute before she can even greet them back.

“Echo! Tell Gabriel that he needs to stop hogging all of the tomatoes!” Hope says teasingly with a playful glare in Gabriel’s direction. She’s cut her hair to just above her shoulder recently, and it bobs with each sway of her head that briefly has Echo mesmerized.

Gabriel just smiles back at Hope with a glint in his eye. “I eat so many of them because there’s an endless amount with how much Echo talks to them! They’re growing like weeds!” He shoots back without heat, his teasing eyes falling on Echo with his words, causing a heat to rise to her cheeks. She loves when he gives her that look. 

“But we should be storing them for colder weather!” Hope argues back. Echo watches as Hope’s eyes slide to the other side of the cabin where Orlando is sitting, whittling away at a piece of wood and ignoring Hope’s pleading look even as he smirks while he works.

Hope realizes quickly that Orlando is a lost cause, settling her focus back on Echo. But before she can go on further about the need to store the tomatoes, Echo swallows down her nerves and lifts the basket full of flowers from her side and offers them to Hope. “I found something for you in the forest,” she starts, feeling almost shy as Hope takes the outstretched basket into her hands. Echo can’t read the look on Hope's face, which only alights her nerves further, forcing words to stumble from her mouth. 

“There’s small blue flowers not far from here, a whole patch of them,” she tells Hope, watching as something like recognition registers on Hope’s face, causing a weird twist in Echo’s stomach. A smile graces Hope’s lips as she reaches into the basket to pull out one of the flowers, and Echo can swear that the smile looks almost— sad.

There’s a tension in the room that wasn’t there moments before when Gabriel was teasing her and Hope, but now as she glances at Gabriel, he’s eyeing her carefully, and Orlando has slowed in his carving in a purposeful way. Echo knows he’s trying to be subtle in the way he’s watching her.

“And I thought—,” Echo continues on, because there’s a silence that has come with the tension, and she doesn’t know what’s going on. She can’t get a read on the situation, a rarity for her. “I thought they’d look nice with your roses on the table,” she finishes weakly, ignoring the watchful gazes of Gabriel and Orlando and focusing solely on Hope glancing up at her with that tight, small smile that is causing another uncomfortable twist in Echo’s stomach.

Without a word, the silence louder than anything else in the cabin, Echo watches as Hope plucks a few more flowers from the basket and walks over to their table where they eat together every night. Hope carefully gathers the flowers in her hand before placing them in the jar with the Herc-a-lees flowers Hope had put there earlier in the week.

But as Echo looks at the jar, she’s surprised to see there aren’t just white roses there, but the same blue flowers in Hope’s hand, only a little wilted, as if they’ve been there for a few days.

She feels her brow scrunch in confusion. How did those get there? She just found them today, and surely Hope would have told her about them if her or Gabriel or even Orlando had found them in a scavenge of their own.

Hope places the fresh blue flowers in the jar, right next to the old ones, and they all watch the action in silence as the tension only grows thicker. Then, she turns towards Echo and walks towards her carefully.

Echo hates the way it makes her feel like she’s being treated like a scared animal.

Once Hope is standing right in front of Echo, she reaches for Echo’s left hand softly, grasping the hand and send a warmth up Echo’s arm.

Echo’s confused eyes meet Hope’s sad ones as she cradles Echo’s hand in her own while gently tugging the long sleeve of Echo’s shirt up with her other hand.

Still lost as to what’s going on, Echo glances down at her now-exposed forearm, surprised to find dark ink looking back at her. It’s a marking on her skin, just like so many grounders on Earth used to have, except instead of thick bands or sharp lines, this marking is a beautiful image.

The tattoo of an elaborate constellation is on her skin, and she’s not exactly sure where that came from.

Echo drinks in the details of the connected stars, feeling a tickling of a memory rattling in her brain just as she looks up to find Hope, Gabriel, and Orlando all watching her intently, as if expecting something from her. She’s just not sure _what_ they want from her.

Still, the memory persists, almost like it's fighting through a fog in her head Echo didn’t even know was there.

“Do you remember?” Hope asks softly, understanding and encouragement in her eyes, trying to conceal that sadness Echo still sees.

But with those words, or really her voice, the memory finally fights through the fog.

Or should she say— memories. The memories flood her mind, and everything clicks.

Because yes, suddenly, finally, she does remember.

Again.

* * *

It happened a year into living on Skyring.

Orlando had finally accepted them back into the cabin, they were eating meals together every night after Echo and Gabriel were finally able to harvest their hard-earned fruits and vegetables, and they had four more years before the Disciples came for Orlando and they could escape to Bardo.

To do that though, they had to train with Orlando in the ways of the Disciples, both in their teachings, and in their fighting. 

Hope and Echo had picked up the fighting easily enough— Hope from her years with Dev, Echo from her years as an Azgedan spy.

But Gabriel?

Gabriel was a scientist. A fighter, he was not.

They tried regular training at first, but when his motivation was minimal with the intent to rely on suits that could make one invisible and weapons they had never used, Echo decided to take on a different approach.

The surprise attacks resulted in much the same way as the first training sessions did in the beginning, but finally, he gave in and started to train. He hated it, still planned on turning invisible the first chance he got, but he let Echo spar with him. He got better at counteracting the surprise attacks. And when he started feeling really confident, he started surprise attacks of his own. 

Now, Echo was a spy. Her training in Azgeda was ingrained into her very essence.

But all it took was Echo to be distracted by Hope sending her a dazzling smile with teasing eyes about catching Echo talking to the tomatoes again and Gabriel not realizing just how unaware Echo was of his presence, for everything to go wrong.

Gabriel had leapt out from a nearby bush with his full weight barreling into her, believing she would either dodge him or flip him onto his back.

Instead, Gabriel charged, Echo fell, and her head smacked against a rock just right that she was knocked out before she could even realize what had happened.

* * *

She woke up in the cabin with Gabriel hovering over her with concern etched deeply in his brow as he brushed a wet cloth against her temple. Hope was pacing behind him anxiously, and when he put pressure on a particularly sensitive spot on her forehead, she let out a groan that caught their attention. 

She supposes that’s where her problems started.

They both looked beautiful. They always did. 

But the relief that graced their features warmed her straight down to the tips of her toes. They were worried about _her_. Their concern was for _her._

She hadn’t felt that way in— well, when she thought about it, she couldn’t remember when. How long had they been here? Why were they here?

Panic began to race up her spine as she tried to sit up.

“Hey, whoa,” Gabriel whispered quietly. He dropped the rag onto his lap as his hands rested on her shoulders to keep her from sitting up. All Echo could focus on was the blood soaked into the rag he had been brushing against her head.

“What happened?” She asked once she acquiesced and laid back down as Hope kneeled next to where Gabriel sat.

“You had us so worried,” Hope breathed, reaching for one of Echo’s hands. 

Gabriel looked more hesitant, a guilt gracing his features that Echo couldn’t understand. “What do you remember?” 

What did she remember?

“I know who I am,” she started tentatively, feeling like she was missing something. “You’re Gabriel,” she gestured towards him weakly, “you’re Hope.” When she realized Orlando was standing against a wall further away from them with his arms crossed, she pointed him out too.

“And where are we?” Gabriel had prompted, still frowning. 

“Skyring.”

“How long have we been here?” He continued.

She opened her mouth to answer as quickly as she had the other questions, but then— she hesitated. How long _had_ they been on Skyring? Was there ever a time they _weren’t_ on Skyring?

The three of them and Orlando, that’s all there’d ever been from what she could remember.

Except, that wasn’t true.

She could tell from the way Gabriel tensed and eyed Hope at Echo’s hesitation.

They told her everything she should already know— that they’d been there on Skyring for a year, that they had four more before they could go save Diyoza and Octavia, that she’d been doing all of this for _Bellamy_.

The more they told her, the more the memories came back, and Gabriel heaved a sigh of relief when she was able to recall back to her days up in space with Bellamy and those on Earth with Roan. 

Temporary amnesia, he said, still concerned, but better than he had been before. 

She went to sleep that night with her memories intact, only to wake under the impression that there was no life for her before Skyring. Her entire world revolved around Skyring, and Hope, and Gabriel, and Orlando.

Gabriel was beside himself with guilt that he caused this selective amnesia, caring for her day and night, retelling stories she heard the previous day over and over again until the memories flooded back, only to be lost the following day. 

He thought it was temporary. He _hoped_ and prayed to a god Echo did not understand that it was temporary.

But in the meantime, she quite liked him taking care of her, fussing over whether she was comfortable and happy in a way she hadn’t felt in, well, quite some time, whether she remembered it or not.

Hope had her start journaling the days so that Echo had something to read back on, to act as a trigger for her memories. It helped to catch her up once her memories came back, but they seemed convinced that the mention of Bellamy was what always brought it all back.

At first, that is.

Orlando was the one who suggested a visual trigger. 

Gabriel was convinced the memories would come back permanently eventually, but in the meantime, Orlando offered to give her a tattoo. Apparently that was something a high-level Disciple was trained in.

“What is something you think of when you think of Bellamy?” He had asked in his gruff voice over dinner one night a few months after the accident. She’d retained her memories for three whole days that week before slipping back again.

At the time, she had thought of space. How her and Bellamy would sit by one of the Ring’s windows and admire the stars as he told her about constellations they couldn’t see from space. So instead, Bellamy had drawn them for her. 

The tattoo helped.

All it would take was for one of them to direct her attention to the constellation on her arm. Ink that she did not remember getting, and the fog would lift from her mind.

Over the years, her bouts of amnesia were less and less, but persisted nonetheless. Her bigger concerns were the butterflies and warmth she felt deep within whenever she was around Hope and Gabriel. 

At first, she thought it was because of Gabriel’s caregiving nature while she was injured. 

Then, she thought it was because Hope took over her gardening duties while she was out of commission, kind as always to lend a helping hand.

But Orlando did just as much for her, and she didn’t have the buzzing energy settle within her like it did when she interacted with Gabriel or Hope, or worse, both of them together. She didn’t get lost in anything relating to Orlando in the way she did in Hope’s bright eyes or Gabriel’s teasing smile.

It took her almost a year after the accident to realize what was going on.

She had just came back from another bout of memory loss, and was reading through her journal. She was reading about her time on the Ring with Bellamy, and with each word, the memories came back clearer and clearer. But what startled her more, was that the feelings of love and affection that once described her feelings towards Bellamy, were now ones she had not just for Gabriel, but Hope too.

Her thumb stroked over the constellation tattoo as the realization settled within her. She loved them, the both of them.

But before she could act on it, she lost her memories again.

The cycle continued. A cycle, frankly, that she was completely and utterly sick of. 

She found her love for Gabriel and Hope growing with each time the memories flooded back. They cared for her, watched out for her, and never lost patience as they continuously reminded her of her life.

With each rush of memories, she wrote of that love more and more in her journal. Yes, she loved Bellamy. She always would. And she had every intent of saving him on Bardo when the countdown on Orlando’s arm expired.

But over her journal entries, she discovered that their romantic love had long since passed. As remiss as she once was years ago to admit it, she believed Bellamy would have Clarke when all was said and done, and Echo— well, she had Gabriel and Hope.

If only she could remember for long enough to act on it.

* * *

Echo is tired.

She’s tired of losing her memory, she’s tired of the sad, guilty glances of the two people she loves most in the universe, and she’s tired of them passing off her small gestures of love as side effects of the amnesia.

Yes, she didn’t remember about the blue flowers this morning, but _clearly_ , she’s thought about Hope multiple times when she’s found the flowers and gathered them for her. How many times does she need to get the woman flowers before she realizes Echo truly _means_ to give her the flowers?

She’s skimming her journal after the most recent recovery— the journal is now too full of words to catch up within a few hours’ time. By the time she were to get through all of the entries, she’d probably be in another bout of memory loss. But from what she can tell, she’s done similar gestures for Gabriel as well, if her journal is anything to go by. She’s scavenged native fruit seeds, plucked bouquets of roses and blue flowers, cooked homegrown meals, and what, they think she’s being _nice_?

Of course she’s being nice, she _loves_ them.

She slams her journal shut on the fourth entry in a row about bringing Hope those damn blue flowers, her ears stinging with embarrassment about how obvious she’s being. 

Gabriel and Hope had decided to go out hunting while Echo catches up on her memories. According to the journal, they always try and make special meals when she has a memory set back. So, it’s just her and Orlando in the cabin when her frustration becomes evident.

“What’s on your mind, young one?” He asks as his eyes never stray from his wood carving.

Echo rolls her eyes at the nickname. “They have to know I have feelings for them at this point, right?” 

At that, Orlando smirks knowingly, eyes still on his wood. “See!” She continues with a swing of her arm, “even _you_ know I have feelings for them!”

Orlando chuckles knowingly, shaking his head and finally looking up from his work to meet her frustrated gaze. “That I do,” he tells her, which is nowhere near helpful. If a man whose beliefs frown upon personal attachments can even see it, how can Gabriel and Hope _not_? “But it’s going to take a lot for them to realize that, and to not think they’re taking advantage of a situation one out of two of them caused.”

“Gabriel didn’t mean to,” she defends immediately. Years later, she _still_ catches him glancing at her guiltily when he thinks she’s not looking.

The thing is, she _always_ looking. 

“So you’ve told me,” Orlando answers easily. “Many, many times,” he mumbles under his breath as he gets back to work.

Echo huffs in frustration, aiming a glare in his direction. He’s not being helpful by pointing out what they all know— neither Gabriel nor Hope will act on their feelings when they feel that Echo isn’t of sound mind. Her mind is very sound though, thank you very much. Memory loss be damned.

But it does give her some resolve. 

She loves them, and she dares to think they might love her too, with Hope’s gentle touches and Gabriel’s longing looks when he’s not drowning in guilt. She truly believes they can love her, and love each other. They can make it work, if they just _let themselves._

Maybe they even think she’s still in love with Bellamy.

She rubs her thumb against the tattoo on her forearm, more habit than anything now, and suddenly, an idea hits her. Her thumb freezes on the constellation as she stares down at it.

They still use the tattoo to trigger her memories, as if they think Bellamy is the beacon to her memories. But she can show them that _they’re_ the ones who pull her back every time.

“Hey Orlando?”

He lifts his head, eyeing her curiously.

“I have a favor to ask.”

* * *

“You think this is stupid,” Echo murmurs in the quiet of the cabin as Orlando’s focus remains steadfast as he methodically pokes the ink into the skin of her forearm.

They’ve been at it for an hour in silence after her impulsive decision, and she’s starting to wonder if she’s only making more of a fool of herself.

Orlando hums at her statement, giving himself time to contemplate an answer. “I do not find it stupid,” he answers finally, never pausing in the pricks to her skin. “I actually find it quite romantic.”

The words startle Echo as she glances up to find the closest thing to a smile she’s ever seen on Orlando’s face.

“Yeah?” She feels her cheeks warming at the thought of her gesture being _romantic_.

“Love persists during the most difficult of times,” he answers, finally pausing to flick his eyes to hers. “That’s what I have learned from the three of you. And if nothing else, you all have certainly endured through years of them, with more to come before we know it. You deserve some happiness in the meantime.”

Echo hasn’t cried in years, but Orlando’s words leave her eyes stinging with emotion. She’ll blame it on the prick of the needle in her arm, but she’s genuinely touched by the older man’s words.

“Do you think it’ll work?” She whispers quietly, afraid of his answer. He can think it’s romantic, and that they all deserve happiness, while still thinking she’s going to fail spectacularly as she’s sure he has watched her be over and over and over again.

Thankfully, he doesn’t pause in his answer this time. “I think if this does not work, then it’s about time you grab that rock you hit your head on and whack them across the head with it too.” Echo huffs out a laugh, giving him an unamused look even as she smiles. “Maybe that’ll knock some sense into them.”

He gives her a wink, lifting the needle away from her skin as he gives her his full attention.

“But just in case,” he adds on with a glint in his eyes, “I’ll camp out by the lake tonight to avoid interrupting anything,” he teases, before getting back to work.

* * *

Hope and Gabriel are gone long enough that Echo goes through second guessing very decision over the past three hours at least five times over before she finally hears them entering through the old rickety gate that squeaks and creaks to signal their arrival.

Orlando made true on his promise after he finished to escape to the lake for the night with an uncharacteristic squeeze of reassurance to her shoulder before leaving, just in time for Hope and Gabriel to barrel through the door with no meat for dinner.

It leaves Echo wondering if they just wanted to give her space.

No matter, she has dinner covered anyways. 

They both halt when they see that she has the table set with dinner plates filled with greens and tomatoes from the garden topped with fresh jellyfish.

“What’s all this?” Hope asks hesitantly, glancing warily over to Gabriel before walking towards the table. Gabriel follows Hope’s lead, though he seems just as hesitant. They settle on the opposite side of the table from where she stands.

“Dinner,” Echo answers simply, gesturing to their seats before taking her own. She made sure that the jar on the table had all fresh roses to accompany the blue ones given to Hope this morning.

They both smile at her, but their lips are tight as they settle into their seats. “How was your day?” Gabriel asks cautiously. The question itself is careful, gauging if she’s lost her memory again already.

It’s been years since an episode has happened twice in a single day, but the worried glance Hope sends Gabriel’s way tells Echo that Hope knows exactly what Gabriel’s doing and thinking. 

“It was good,” Echo responds easily, beginning to spoon some jellyfish onto her spoon. “Spent a good portion of the day with Orlando.”

Both true, but also pretty vague responses. She feels bad about it when they share another worried glance, but it’ll be worth it if this works.

They don’t react anymore on their beliefs that her memory needs to be triggered for the second time today, instead choosing to dig into their meals. It’s a quiet dinner, but she knows they appreciate it with how they devour it. She made sure to give both of them a few extra tomatoes, whether they realize it or not.

“So what did you guys get up to today?” She asks as they finish their plates.

“Gabriel scared off any game,” Hope snorts. “It’s not like hunting with you,” she tells Echo fondly, that warmth settling within Echo with such a simple look and statement.

Gabriel rolls his eyes, opening his mouth to retort, but Echo beats him to it. “I should have come with you.” 

They both pause. It’s all the answer she needs for her earlier suspicion. They purposefully didn’t take her because they thought she needed time to herself and her memories. Only for her to lose them again, in their eyes.

It’s Gabriel that reaches for her left hand this time. Still, the same warmth shoots up her arm as he grips her hand. He laces their fingers together for no longer than a moment before he’s gliding his hand up her wrist in a soft caress to push her sleeve up. 

She waits for the next question to fall from one of their lips. 

_Do you remember?_

They’ll want her to look at the ink, think of Bellamy to recall how long they’ve been here and why they’re here.

But she _does_ remember this time, so when she looks down at her forearm, she knows what she’s going to find. It’s _them_ that are gasping in surprise when their eyes fall on the new markings on her skin.

“What are those?” Hope whispers, eyes trained on the new tattoos that accompany Bellamy’s constellation.

Gabriel says nothing, but his fingers carefully trace over tomato plant vines that weave through the lines of the constellation.

“New tattoos.” Echo’s voice is strained as Hope stands from the table to walk around and sit close to Echo, her pointer finger joining Gabriel’s touch, except Hope’s focus is on the flowers surrounding the tomato vibes and constellation, identical to the blue ones picked fresh for her this morning and the Herc-a-lees roses. Orlando created the images with deep black ink that permanently represents both Gabriel and Hope on Echo’s body.

They seem lost in gazing at the tattoos, and their touch on her skin is alighting a fire in her blood.

“They, um,” she starts, stops, when they both look up at her with an intensity that takes her breath away. “They’re to remind me of the both of you.”

“I don’t understand,” Gabriel says with that adorable scrunch of his brow Echo has grown so fond of. His sentiment is echoed with a nod of Hope’s head.

Echo takes a deep breath. This is it.

“You guys think that it’s Bellamy that brings the memories back. And maybe that was it at first, but my feelings for him have changed over the years, and I think you both know that,” she eyes them both knowingly as they both look in separate directions. “Obviously I want to save him, and your mom,” she adds as she reaches for Hope’s hand that is still on her arm, “and Octavia. But it’s not Bellamy that brings me back every time. It’s you,” Echo says to Hope, squeezing her hand, “and you,” she reaches for Gabriel with her other hand so that she’s gripping onto both of them firmly. “ _You both_ are the reason my memories come back. Your voices, your actions, your words,” a deep breath for the last piece she needs to tell them. “I love you both so much, and I need you to know that memory loss or not, that’s not going to change.”

She probably says it more firmly than she needs to, but the words are out in the open, and there’s nothing to do but wait for their reactions now.

The silence that follows, though, is gut wrenching. 

Echo dares to glance from Hope to Gabriel, both looking at her in shock. She opens her mouth to say something, maybe to apologize for making a fool of herself yet again, but before she can, Hope is pulling her hand from Echo’s grip to reach out from her position next to Echo to grip Echo’s face in both her hands and kiss her soundly, all while Gabriel holds onto her other hand.

The kiss is over before Echo can even register it happened, but her eyes fall closed nonetheless, trying to savor the warmth of Hope’s lips against her own.

Hope’s looking at her hesitantly, so even though she doesn’t want to let go of Gabriel, Echo can’t stop herself from using both of her hands to tug Hope as close as she can get to place a far more passionate kiss to her lips that leaves Hope gasping into her mouth. 

By the time they separate for air, Gabriel’s moved to their side of the table and is kneeling in front of them, looking at the both of them with a heat in his eyes Echo’s never seen before.

“I feel the same,” Gabriel says hoarsely, looking from Echo, to Hope. “After centuries with Josie, I thought my time for love was done, and then you two stormed into my life in the most unexpected way possible. And then I ruined _everything_ ,” he says morosely, looking back to Echo with all of the guilt he’s been carrying for the years since her accident. 

“You didn’t,” Echo swears to him, cradling his face in her hand and marveling at how he leans into her touch. “You didn’t ruin anything.”

Gabriel hums in response as he closes his eyes, turning his face to press the gentlest kiss to the palm of her hand. She gasps as he continues the soft kisses up past her wrist, making his way to her newly inked skin. 

“I can’t believe you got tattoos for us,” he whispers against the skin, sending goosebumps up her arm. Hope reaches out to wrap her arm around Echo’s middle, her chin resting on Echo’s shoulder while Hope rests her other hand on Gabriel’s shoulder. He can’t stop planting kisses to the tomato vines, making Echo smile more than she has since coming to Skyring. 

“I love you too,” Hope murmurs into Echo’s shoulder, leaning toward to rest her forehead against Gabriel’s when he lifts his head from Echo’s arm. “You both mean the world to me. I never thought I could be so lucky, especially after—”

Hope pauses, but Echo and Gabriel know she was going to mention her mom, and Octavia, and Dev.

“We will find them,” Echo vows, admiring these two beautiful humans, heads tilted toward one another lovingly. Can she be so lucky? “We will find them, and Bellamy, but—”

“But?” Gabriel prompts, pulling back to look at her, Hope following suit.

“But don’t we deserve some happiness in the meantime?”

At her words, she can’t help but note the knowing look that Hope and Gabriel share.

“What is it?” She asks, feeling as if she is missing something, a feeling she’s all too familiar with.

Gabriel shakes his head ruefully, nudging Hope to talk. She does, but not before shaking her head with a smile.

“It’s just that, Orlando’s been telling us the same thing.”

They all pause, as the words register for Echo. And then they all burst out laughing, giddily, happily, and without a care in the universe, sharing kisses between them because they now know they can.

* * *

Meanwhile, the Disciple Orlando sits himself out by the lake, listening to the laughs of the three lovers within the cabin.

He smiles to himself, content with a job well done.

He may be teaching them all there is to know about Bardo, but they have yet to realize how much they have taught him.

About sacrifice, yes, but more importantly— love.

**Author's Note:**

> (Orlando ships it.)


End file.
